Genghis Khan is world famous for founding the Mongol empire that spanned 24 million square kilometers, accounting for 16% of the world’s area.
With fierce territorial ambitions, Genghis Khan extended the Mongol empire from the shores of the Pacific Ocean to the Danube in Europe during the late 12th and early 13th centuries. This merciless warrior turned his hooves into a deadly battlefield, but he also left a surprising legacy in his lineage. An estimated 16 million men alive today are descended from the descendants of Genghis Khan.
It is estimated that one out of every 200 men alive today is a direct descendant of Genghis Khan. Photo: Getty Images
According to Allthatsinteresting, the infamous emperor of Mongolia passed away eight centuries ago, but his legacy lives on thanks to his numerous descendants throughout the conquered territories.
Genghis Khan’s strategies as a conqueror were so effective that he sacked most of Asia by AD 1206, and also produced a large number of offspring anywhere. who set foot in.
Genghis Khan is world famous for founding the Mongol empire that spanned 24 million square kilometers, accounting for 16% of the world’s area. Photo: Sohu
Historians have long known that Genghis Khan had many children with six wives and an innumerable number of concubines, but the startling details were only revealed in a 2003 study.
Published in the American Journal of Human Genetics, the “Genetic Legacy of the Mongols” study found that 0.5% of the world’s male population is genetically descended from Genghis Khan and 8% males living in his former territory have identical Y chromosomes.
So in the end, how many children did Genghis Khan have? The answers were also amazing.
Genghis Khan had at least 6 wives and countless concubines. Image: Wikimedia Commons
Scary conqueror
Born in 1162 during a time of great conflict between the Mongol tribes, Genghis Khan descended from a long line of warriors and was named Temujin, after a Tatar leader his father had captured. Legend has it that when he was born, Temujin’s right hand held a blood clot, which the Mongols believed fate gave him the position of leader.
At the age of 9, Genghis Khan’s father died at the hands of a rival. Later, the boy was rejected by his own tribe. Genghis Khan and his family lived in poverty. Gradually, the half-brother began to claim the position of head of the family, much to Genghis Khan’s anger. The outrage reached its peak when Genghis Khan killed his half-brother with an arrow.
His Empress
Determined to unite the nomadic tribes of the Mongolian plateau, Genghis Khan married an outsider and fathered four sons with a woman named Borte. Genghis Khan’s first children were named Jochi, Chagatai, Ogedei and Tolui, followed by numerous younger brothers.
Genghis Khan encouraged 20,000 warriors to join the campaign to destroy the Tatars, and led his army to sweep across the continent. He taught them how to ride horses without using their hands. That technique allowed warriors to use spears and spears with hooks to tear apart enemies on horseback.
After ordering the killing of the surviving male survivors and boiling the head of an enemy tribe alive, the Mongol general forced any woman he pleased to be his concubine.
Genghis Khan (above left) and several of his direct descendants. Image: Wikimedia Commons
“The greatest joy for a man is to defeat his enemies, take everything he owns, see those he loves in tears, ride horses and hold their wives and daughters in their arms. hands,” declared Genghis Khan.
Over the next 20 years, the First Emperor of Mongolia conquered most of present-day Russia, China, Iraq, Korea, Eastern Europe, and India. While the cause of the Mongol conqueror’s death remains the subject of scholarly debate, the subject of his lineage has recently been explored in more depth.
How many children does Genghis Khan have?
The international team of experts who authored a genetic study in 2003 thought of a question: “How many people are related to Genghis Khan?”. To find out, they studied 5,000 blood samples collected over a 10-year period from more than 40 communities living in areas in and near the former Mongol empire.
There is a community beyond the former borders of the Mongol empire that traces his lineage – the Persian-speaking Hazara ethnic group of Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Spencer Wells, geneticist and co-author of the study, said: “The Hazara gave us the first clue of a connection to Genghis Khan. They have a long-standing belief that they are his direct descendants.”
“We have identified a Y-chromosome lineage with several anomalous elements,” the study said. It is found in 16 populations across a large area of Asia, stretching from the Pacific Ocean to the Caspian Sea, and is present with high frequency: about 8% of men in this region carry the chromosome there, and thus account for about 0.5% of the total male population in the world. “
Experts have found a special lineage from 1,000 years ago that belongs to Genghis Khan himself and revealed that 1 in 200 men alive today are his descendants. Coincidentally, some scholars have estimated that the first Mongol Emperor made more than 1,000 women pregnant during his rule. The geneticists added that Genghis Khan’s territorial expansion and the spread of his lineage were correlated.
The Hazara people of Pakistan believe that they are the genetic descendants of Genghis Khan. Photo: Wikimedia Commons.
Tracing the “sons” of Genghis Khan today
Although the 21st century has finally turned the tracing of Genghis Khan’s descendants into a scientific endeavor, it is unclear how many children he actually had. After all, only his first four sons with Börte were officially recognized, of which Jochi had at least 16, Chagatai 15.
“This is a clear example that culture plays a huge role in the patterns of genetic variation and diversity in human populations,” says historian Wells. This is the first documented case where human culture has caused a single genetic lineage to grow to enormous proportions in just a few hundred years.”
Genghis Khan’s harem is mostly female enemies.
Meanwhile, Genghis Khan died of mysterious reasons in 1227. Australian researchers claim that he hid his impending death to keep the Mongols moral, leading to rumors that he was infected or died in battle. One legend even holds that a warrior princess castrated Genghis Khan and watched him bleed to death.
The final answer to the number of people related to Genghis Khan remains a mystery, as only the discovery of his grave and the extraction of his genetic material can solve the question this once and for all